Gary's New Rival
by Hit-to-Key
Summary: This is not, in any way, canon. At all. In fact, I think I'll even exclude Ash. :D Yes, there will be Falkner.
1. The Dream

"_Vulpix, Ember!"_

_The attack hit, leaving Eevee with a serious burn._

"_Eevee, Tackle!"_

_Vulpix was hit, but it was barely effective, considering Eevee was in too much pain to put up much of a fight now. The two Pokemon stood and stared at each other for about half a minute. Then, Eevee fell. The female owning the Vulpix called its name, and the fire fox ran back to its trainer._

"_You never learn..."_

–

Gary woke up, sweating. He looked around and saw Eevee sleeping at the foot of his bed.

"Another dream about her..." Gary said to nobody in particular, "It would be a little less frustrating if I at least knew her name. Then, I could do some checking around to see if she's real, or just some girl in my dreams."

He looked at the clock. 2:13 AM.

'Way too early to even think about getting up...' He thought.

Gary sighed and laid back down. He fell back asleep after what seemed like forever.

–

Gary woke up _again_ later on. It was 7:58 AM. He figured it'd be early enough to start asking around. He looked deep into his memory for a description of the girl. Gary decided to just draw a picture of her.

Gary was going to do a quick sketch, but ended up tracing over the drawing and coloring it. A girl with long, dark brown hair with brown eyes had her hand on her hip and a Vulpix at her side, spitting out flames. He stared for a little while, then snapped back to reality.

"We should go ask around now, huh, Eevee?"

"Vee..!" Eevee happily exclaimed.

He asked some random people, getting the same answer each time. 'No, sorry.' But, after a little while, he got a different answer.

"Yeah, I know that girl! She beat my Tangela with that Vulpix of hers! I think she said her name was... Mai!"

"Mai, is it...?" Gary mumbled to himself. He then uttered a thank you and ran off with his Eevee.

"We should train today. First thing tomorrow, we'll actually start looking for her... Mai!"


	2. Evolution

"Thank you, come again!" One of the shop clerks yelled as Mai left the Celedon Department store. She had just bought a Fire Stone for Vulpix. Mai always had Vulpix out of her Great Ball, but she usually forgets and grabs for it. Vulpix has to tug on her pants or rub against her legs to show that she was out, if this should happen.

Vulpix thought the same thing was happening now, but she was really grabbing a Pokeball containing a different Pokemon. Mai gave Vulpix the Fire Stone and watched as she evolved into a Ninetales. She then called out the Pokemon in the ball.

"Raptor!!" The bird yelled as he was called out. Staraptor was an extremely defiant Pokemon, and it made him even angrier at his trainer that she thought it was cute when he disobeyed her. This encouraged Staraptor to obey, just to dissapoint her. It amused him when she pouted at his sudden listening skills the first time he gave up disobeying her.

"Staraptor, can you Fly us back to Johto real quick? It's closer to Hoenn, which is closer to Sinnoh. We can take a rest at Voilet City and visit Falkner!"

Staraptor's eyes widened at the mention of Falkner's name, and immediately flew off. Staraptor had been caught as a Starly, along with Falkner's. Both of the trainers caught the birds at the same time, in the same place. Since then, Mai had developed a bond with him. They stuck together for awhile until he left to return to Johto. Mai blushed as she remembered that one day...

–

*Flashback

_Mai and Falkner had just finished their fight. Falkner won, to his own surprise. It was the first time he ever did. Morty was sitting by on the sidelines. He suddenly smirked._

"_You know the rules, you two." He said mischievously. Morty had decided to make a bet. If Mai won, she could have the Zephyr badge. Falkner always refused it to her because rumors would spread that he only gave it to her because they were 'madly in love' or something, not because she won it fairly. However, if Falkner won, he had to kiss Mai._

_He glared at Morty and made his way over to Mai. Blushing, he looked down and pinned her to the wall. That was also something he had to do. Stupid Morty. His cheecks became even redder as he slowly moved his lips up to hers. He closed his eyes and... pulled away. He couldn't do it. Falkner didn't want to ruin their friendship because of some dumb bet. Falkner explained this to Morty, making him frown._

"_Alright, fine. Have it your way..."_

–

Hours had passed, and Mai was almost at Voilet City. Staraptor was getting tired, so she made him land at the half-way point between Cherrygrove and Voilet. She recalled Staraptor to his Pokeball and started walking with Ninetales. Once they reached Voilet City, they made their way to the gym.

"Here we come, Falkner!"


	3. Evolution 2

"Yeah, I saw a girl like that heading to the Celedon City department store a little while ago!" A woman said in response to Gary's drawing of Mai. The said boy ran to the department store and searched the entire place. After about an hour, of wandering around, a clerk got curious.

"Are you looking for something, kid?" He asked.

"Er.. yeah," Gary said, showing that same clerk the picture.

"Oh, her? She bought a Fire Stone from me about an hour and a half ago."

'Damn...' He thought.

"On our lunch break, the clerk at the front desk- you know, on the first floor?- said that she saw that same girl leave on a huge bird Pokemon." He said, leaning on the counter in front of him.

"... Well, thanks anyway..." He said, dissapointed.

–

After he had left the department store, Gary let Eevee out of its Pokeball.

"No luck."

Something caught Eevee's eye. A black, ever-so-slightly brown-tinted feather on the ground. The fox-like Pokemon picked it up and carried it to his master.

"Huh? What's that?" Gary asked. Then, it hit him. "This must be a feather of the bird that clerk was talking about!"

The boy put the feather in his pocket and called Eevee's name as he ran ahead.

'She couldn't have gotten too far...'

–

After hours of running around, the pair was at Fuschia City. It was night time, and Gary was getting hungry. He figured Eevee was, too, and looked for a resturaunt. It took him what seemed like forever to find a diner where Pokemon were allowed to eat with their trainers.

After leaving the diner, Eevee started to glow. Gary watched, awestruck as Eevee evolved into...

"Bree!" The newly evolved Umbreon called, its golden rings glowing in the moonlight. Gary simply stared. After he snapped back to reality, they went to the Pokemon Center to get some rest. Hopefully, their search would work better tomorrow.


End file.
